The New York Times chief White House correspondent Peter Baker said it is time for the White House Correspondents’ Association to “rethink” its annual dinner with the president, after the event with President Donald Trump did not “advance” the First Amendment.
Baker shared his two cents on the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in a Saturday post on X, one day after it happened. The WHCD was rescheduled from April 25, when the bash ended just minutes after it started due to yet another assassination attempt on Trump.
“Have been a member of the WHCA almost continuously since the 1990s. Our mission is to defend the First Amendment rights of White House correspondents to report on the president without fear or favor. Unfortunately last night did advance that cause,” Baker posted. “Time to rethink the dinner.”
Baker’s wife, The New Yorker staff writer Susan Glasser, seemed disgusted with the event as well.
She posted on Friday, “#FirstAmendment. If journalists won’t stand up for it, hard to ask everyone else to.”
Baker’s comments stand out, considering just two years ago he received the WHCD award for “Excellence in Presidential News Coverage Under Deadline Pressure.”
He was honored for his coverage of then-President Joe Biden’s trip to Israel just days after the 10/7 Hamas terrorist attack; Baker smiled and shook Biden’s hand after receiving the award, plus a $2,500 prize to go along with it.
Baker and Biden at the 2024 WHCD (Credit: The Washington Post on YouTube)
The Trump-Baker relationship hasn’t been as friendly, though.
Trump went off on Baker, his wife, and his colleague Maggie Haberman — and the “SICK” and “TRUMP DERANGED” NYT editors — early in his second term.
“The Failing New York Times insists on using Liddle’ Peter Baker, a really bad writer and Obama biographer and sycophant, to write many of the long and boring Fake News hit pieces against me,” Trump posted in March 2025. “The only two people with less talent than Peter are his ‘wife,’ the lovely Susan Glasser, and, of course, Maggot Hagerman, who may be the least talented writer in the entire stable of New York Times’ MEDIOCRITY!”
His post came a month after Baker wrote Trump had “demonstrated once again a brazen willingness to advance distortions, conspiracy theories and outright lies to justify major policy decisions” since returning to the Oval Office.
More recently, Baker said Trump’s threats against Iran and rants about the pope had “left many with the impression of a deranged autocrat mad with power.”
Baker’s call for the WHCD to be reconsidered followed Trump comparing CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins to trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney and making fun of California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), among other notable moments on Friday night.
Watch above via CNN.
The post Top NYT Reporter Calls on Journos to ‘Rethink’ Annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner After Trump first appeared on Mediaite.
